In the wake of the Polar Vortex – and in preparation for other freakish weather patterns the future has in store – we present five essential, design-minded items to keep your home safe, well-lit and warm during a power outage.
1 Everpurse: A Phone-Charging Purse
The clutch for when you’re in a clutch, this handy little item (a Kickstarter success story) is useful, storm or no storm. Slip your iPhone and Galaxy android into Everpurse‘s interior pocket, and the purse – charged overnight on a wireless mat – gives it the juice it needs for a full recharge. The 21.5-by-18-centimetre customized purses come in two styles and are available in leather and fabric. From $190
2 Iiamo Go: A Self-Heating Baby Bottle
Iiamo Go, by Danish baby product manufacturer Iiamo, is the first bottle in the world to self-warm 180 millilitres of milk to 37 degrees celsius in four minutes, and without using a microwave, hot water or an electric heating device. The bottle comes with a disposable polypropylene cartridge filled with water and salt; when the cartridge is inserted into the bottle, its salt is rehydrated – a process that generates enough heat to warm the milk and keep it warm for 20 minutes. Karim Rashid designed the bottle, using his signature curves, in BPA-free plastic. $30
3 Little Sun: A Wearable Solar Flashlight
Designed to give off-the-grid communities access to artificial light – and without having to burn kerosene – the LED-powered Little Sun, by Olafur Eliasson (pictured) and engineer Frederik Ottesen, has already been introduced into Centre Pompidou’s permanent collection and nominated for Design Museum’s 2013 Designs of the Year Award. With two levels, soft and bright, it can emit up to 10 hours of light with a five-hour charge. The company sells the product at a higher price in on-grid areas to allow it to be inexpensively distributed in impoverished communities around the world, and to help start local businesses to distribute them further. From $30
4 GoSun Stove: A Cooker Powered by the Sun
Where do we start? It bake, boils or fries a meal without fuel – so there’s no charcoal, wood, or even open flames to worry about. And, it weighs less than 1.8 kilograms. Since surpassing its goal in a Kickstarter campaign last September, the solar cooker GoSun Stove has been in high demand. It’s made of a glass tube encased by copper, stainless steel and aluminum nitrile coatings that work passively to capture 80 to 90 per cent of the sun’s thermal energy. Once the stove is oriented to the sun, you fill the stainless steel tray with food, or even water, and slip it into the chamber. A 1.3 kilogram steak will cook in under 40 minutes, while six hot dogs take 10 minutes. $280
5 WiseWay Pellet Stove: A Heater Fueled by Gravity
The WiseWay Pellet Stove lets you have a continuous indoor fire during an outage and doesn’t require stoking. The unit’s natural gravity system and thermal draft periodically open up the compartment holding the bag of wood pellets (which can last up to 36 hours), continually feeding the stove on a regular basis. An internal fan distributes the heat in a room up to 185 square metres, and a wheel attachment allows the unit to move as needed. By adding a water jacket that produces steam power, you can charge a battery system to turn on the lights. From $1,800